Prep football: Roseville’s last-second field goal knocks off Inderkum in wild finale

Joel Bradley didn’t need to watch his kick. He knew it was good.

With three seconds left on the clock against host Inderkum, Roseville’s junior kicker hammered the ball through the middle of the uprights Friday night. His 27-yard boot as time expired gave Roseville a 33-31 win.

Before anyone had a chance to react to the kick, Bradley was already sprinting toward the sideline, gesturing at his teammates and fans. Bradley is a section-champion sprinter, so it took a few seconds for his teammates to catch up.

After the celebration – which irked Inderkum players and coaches because Roseville players ended up standing in the middle of the home team’s logo on the 50-yard line – Bradley was interviewed by KCRA about the kick. He might have said 10 words in his TV debut. His coach jokingly referred to him as “a man of few words.”

Bradley has a reputation for speaking his mind, often and constantly, according to senior quarterback Brandon Graydon. But it was Graydon who had some words for Bradley before the snap came on the final play.

“(The snap) was a little high but before the kick itself I told (Bradley), no matter what, just kick it, cuz I mean, we’re not going to race it in for two, and if I put the ball on (the tee) like a hot dog, just kick it,” Graydon said. “So I told him that, I caught it, got it down as quick as I could, laces are out and he got it through the uprights.”

The kick didn’t surprise Roseville coach Adam Reinking. He referred to Bradley as an under-the-radar college prospect. It was easy to see why. Bradley earned touchbacks on a few kickoffs, aided by a stiff tailwind.

His winning kick ended a wild second half as Inderkum fought all the way back from a 23-10 deficit at the start of the fourth quarter to take a 31-30 lead with 1:45 remaining.

“I know a lot of those kids on their team,” Bradley said. “They’re great athletes. I run track with them. So yeah, they’re good competition.”

Everybody from Roseville echoed that sentiment. Graydon said the team circled the game with Inderkum as the biggest on the schedule months ago. Inderkum is always bigger and faster than most visiting teams. Reinking’s eyes bulged while giving Inderkum praise.

“They’re good,” he said, emphasizing the word good. “They’re big and physical. I think sometimes when we get off the bus teams think they’re gonna beat us just because we’re not physically imposing. … But when we play teams that are more physical than us, we have stuff in the playbook that can take advantage of our skill guys.”

Reinking and Roseville also had to dig deep into the roster for help. Roseville lost linebacker and long-snapper Joey Bagley in the first quarter to a broken hand. Linebacker Jaden Keirsey injured his shoulder in the first quarter and didn’t play again.

Then came the unlikely heroes. Senior defensive lineman Xavier Garcia had never played linebacker before, but he filled in nicely during the second half in his debut. Logan Fox doesn’t get any reps at linebacker in practice but he made a toe-tapping catch that should have been ruled an interception in the second half.

As players were hurt on both sides, the score tilted from one team to another. Inderkum took a 10-0 first-half lead with a safety earned by speedy linebacker Dexter Simmons II and an 18-yard touchdown run by Giovanni Jorlen.

Then Roseville scored 23 unanswered points to take the 23-10 lead into the fourth quarter. Inderkum scored on a 3-yard plunge by Simmons and a 3-yard run from Bryson Claxton to tie it at 23 with 4:00 left. But Roseville worked a reverse on the ensuing kickoff and Christopher O’Neal scampered 80 yards for a touchdown to retake the lead.

Again, Inderkum answered, as Jorlen scored on a 3-yard run, then took in a 2-point conversion to earn a 31-30 margin with 1:45 left.

Facing a third-and-16 from the 49-yard line, Graydon hit Bradley for a 19-yard pass to get to the 30, then hit him again on a 7-yard pass to move to the 23. The offense crept down to the 10-yard line before Bradley ended the game.

The passes to Bradley were no accident. After Inderkum started the game with tremendous defensive pressure, Roseville started rolling Graydon out of the pocket to look for Bradley, the track star, who found ways to get open along the sideline.

“That was hitting all day,” Graydon said. “It was working. We saw it and we just kept going at it.”

Graydon, wearing socks with roses on them that say “Menace,” was just that for Inderkum. He completed 8 of 18 passes for 134 yards and a touchdown. He also ran 17 yards for a touchdown.

Inderkum relied on Jorlen’s legs to do most of the offensive work. He had 33 rushes for 245 yards and two touchdowns.

As the team sat dejected for the postgame talk, Inderkum coach Reggie Harris took no pity on them. There were far too many penalties and mistakes for pity.

“We defeated ourselves in the first half and then we came back fighting in the second half,” he told them. “Don’t shed a tear because we gave it to them.”